Review

Children's book of the week

The Seeing by Diana HendryBodley Head £10.99/ebook £11.47, Age 11+, ST
Bookshop price £9.89
This novel is a powerful return, after a 10-year gap, for Whitbread-winning
Hendry. Set in a seaside town in 1953, it focuses on the aftermath of war.
Lizzie, a 13-year-old from a very proper family, is won over by the
exoticness of wild Natalie, whose father died in a POW camp, and who has a
strange, vengeful obsession in which she involves her eight-year-old
brother, who has learning difficulties. Natalie and Lizzie share the
cleverly interwoven triple narrative with Hugo, an artist who spends the
summer in a yellow caravan on the beach, having lost his own brother to the
Nazis, and who becomes a benevolent friend to the children. With a
surprising denouement, this is an intriguing, atmospheric and memorable tale.